NEW DELHI, January 27: Increasing urbanisation and influx of outsiders has changed the demographic profile of Outer Delhi -- the parliamentary constituency with the largest number of voters in the country. The predominantly rural character of the constituency has been swamped by the rapid expansion of the city.Once a Congress stronghold, the constituency has seen several highs and lows. The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) candidate, K.L. Sharma, won the last Lok Sabha elections by a convincing majority defeating the Congress candidate Sajjan Kumar by 2.5 lakh votes.
This time, the contest will be between Deep Chand Sharma of Congress and Sharma from BJP. One time chairman of the Standing Committee, Deep Chand lost the assembly elections, which he contested from the Trinagar constituency. This is the first time he is contesting the Lok Sabha polls.
With nearly 2.9 million voters, the constituency is known as the `Jat belt' of the Capital. In fact, the unwieldy constitiuency was represented by twocandidates in the first two Lok Sabha polls. It was only from 1962 that it was made into one constituency. The constituency includes nearly 200 villages, the maximum number for any constituency in the Capital. It has, among others, the areas of Mehrauli, Badarpur, Bawana, Najafgarh, Nangloi, Vasant Kunj, Rohini, Pitampura, Shalimar Bagh.
Because of the number of villages and the largely rural populace, at one time it was the village panchayats who used to decide the fate of the political candidates. From 1963 to 1977 it was Choudhary Brahm Prakash, the Congress heavyweight, who was elected four times in succession. In 1977, he contested as a Janata Party candidate and won.
But changes began in 1980 when the Delhi Development Authority (DDA) began acquiring land from farmers.
Urban colonies came up where villages and rural settlements used to exist. These new colonies of Pitampura, Rohini, Pashim Vihar, Shalimar Bagh, Saraswati Vihar and Vikaspuri on one hand brought in urbanites. On the other hand, thefarmers who sold their land for quick money also found that they became poor overnight. Both these factors turned political equations topsy-turvy and the rural population's say decreased considerably.
Apart from the DDA's ventures, it was the unauthorised colonies, the JJ clusters and the resettlement colonies that sprouted up in the area which increasingly began to decide political fortunes. All political parties, realising the importance of these unauthorised and resettlement colonies as a major vote bank, started exploiting them.
It was in 1980 that Sajjan Kumar won from this constituency and entered mainstream politics. The resettlement colonies in Mongolpuri and Sultanpuri are considered his vote bank. However, in 1984, he was denied the ticket because of his alleged role in the riots after Indira Gandhi's assassination. In 1991, he won again, defeating BJP leader and Delhi Chief Minister Sahib Singh.
However, in 1996, it was the BJP candidate K.L. Sharma, who defeated Kumar. The victory, was agreat setback to Kumar, who was considered invincible till then. Kumar's defeat, which left even his opponents surprised, was largely attributed to Sahib Singh, who campaigned actively for him and wooed the Jats for him. It was also seen that affluent voters, residing in Saket, Vasant Vihar and Vasant Kunj, chose not to vote for him.
However, instead of consolidating his political gains, Sharma chose to ignore the constituency. This has left the voters fuming and he is charged with not having bothered to visit the constituency even once in the past 18 months.
Copyright © 1998 Indian Express Newspapers (Bombay) Ltd.
